by
Vanessa N. Raabe;
Gerrit Kann;
Bruce Ribner;
Andres Morales;
Jay Varkey;
Aneesh Mehta;
George Lyon III;
Sharon Vanairsdale;
Kelly Faber;
Stephan Becker;
Markus Eickmann;
Thomas Strecker;
Shelley Brown;
Ketan Patel;
Philipp De Leuw;
Gundolf Schuettfort;
Christoph Stephan;
Holger Rabenau;
John D. Klena;
Pierre E. Rollin;
Anita McElroy;
Ute Stroher;
Stuart Nichol;
Colleen Kraft;
Timo Wolf
Published by Oxford University Press for the Infectious Diseases Society of America. All rights reserved. Two patients with Lassa fever are described who are the first human cases treated with a combination of ribavirin and favipiravir. Both patients survived but developed transaminitis and had prolonged detectable virus RNA in blood and semen, suggesting that the possibility of sexual transmission of Lassa virus should be considered.
Objective: Healthcare personnel (HCP) were recruited to provide serum samples, which were tested for antibodies against Ebola or Lassa virus to evaluate for asymptomatic seroconversion.Setting: From 2014 to 2016, 4 patients with Ebola virus disease (EVD) and 1 patient with Lassa fever (LF) were treated in the Serious Communicable Diseases Unit (SCDU) at Emory University Hospital. Strict infection control and clinical biosafety practices were implemented to prevent nosocomial transmission of EVD or LF to HCP.Participants: All personnel who entered the SCDU who were required to measure their temperatures and complete a symptom questionnaire twice daily were eligible.Results: No employee developed symptomatic EVD or LF. EVD and LF antibody studies were performed on sera samples from 42 HCP. The 6 participants who had received investigational vaccination with a chimpanzee adenovirus type 3 vectored Ebola glycoprotein vaccine had high antibody titers to Ebola glycoprotein, but none had a response to Ebola nucleoprotein or VP40, or a response to LF antigens.Conclusions: Patients infected with filoviruses and arenaviruses can be managed successfully without causing occupation-related symptomatic or asymptomatic infections. Meticulous attention to infection control and clinical biosafety practices by highly motivated, trained staff is critical to the safe care of patients with an infection from a special pathogen.